Thera 10.5: Kappa
Tipitaka >> Sutta Pitaka >> Khuddaka Nikaya >> Theragatha >> Thera(237):Kappa Adapted from the Archaic Translation by Mrs. C.A.F. Rhys Davids. Note: 'C' in Pali text is pronounced as 'ch' as in 'China'. ---- Chapter X. Ten Verses =237. Kappa= Reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Magadha, as the son of a provincial hereditary (king)rāja'','' he succeeded his father, but was addicted to self-indulgence and sensuality. Him the Lord(Buddha) saw, as he aroused himself from a reverie(trance/samadhi) 260 of great compassion and surveyed the world for treasure for his net of insight. And pondering, 'What now will he become?' he discerned that 'This one, hearing from me a discourse on foul things, will have his heart diverted from lusts, and will renounce the world and win arahantship(enlightenment).' Going to Kappa through the air, he addressed to him these verses: ---- 567 Nānākuṇapasampuṇṇo mahāukkārasambhavo,|| Candanikaɱ va paripakkaɱ mahāgaṇḍo mahāvaṇo.|| || 568 Pubbaruhirasampuṇṇo gūthakūpena gāḷahito,|| Āpo paggharaṇo kāyo sadā sandati pūtikaɱ.|| || 569 Saṭṭhikaṇḍarasambandho 60 maɱsalepanalepito,|| Cammakañcukasannaddho pūtikāyo niratthako.|| || 570 Aṭṭhasaŋghāṭaghaṭito nahāru suttanibandhano,|| Nekesaɱ saŋgatibhāvā kappeti iriyāpathaɱ.|| || 571 Dhuvappayāto maraṇassa maccurājassa santike,|| Idheva chaḍḍayitvāna yena kāmaŋgamo naro.|| || 572 Avijjā nivuto kāyo catuganthena gatthito,|| Oghasaɱsīdano kāyo anusayajālamotthato.|| || 573 Pañcanīvaraṇe yutto vitakkena samappito,|| Taṇhāmūlenānugato mohacchadanachādito.|| || 574 Evāyaɱ vattate kāyo kammayantena yantito,|| Sampatti ca vipattyantā ninābhāvo vipajjati.|| || 575 Yemaɱ kāyaɱ mamāyanti andhabālā puthujjanā,|| Vaḍḍhenti kaṭasiɱ gheraɱ ādiyanti punabbhavaɱ.|| || 576 Ye'maɱ kāyaɱ vivajjenti gūthalittaɱ'va pannagaɱ,|| Bhavamūlaɱ vamitvāna parinibbantyanāsavā. || || ---- 567 Filled full with many things impure, Great heap of excrement, Like stale and stagnant pool of slime, Like a great cancer, like a sore, 568 Filled full of serum and of blood, As it were from dung-heap issuing, Dropping with fluid-ever thus The body leaks, a carrion thing. 569 By sixty tendons kept in place, And smeared with plaster of the flesh, By dermis armed and cuticle - In carrion carcase lies small gain. 570 By bony framework rendered firm, By sinew-threads together knit, The which, as they in concert work, Effect our postures manifold; 571 Faring world without end to death, Even to the King of Mortals' realm: - If it be even here thrown off, A man may go wherever he will.1 572 The body covered in ignorance, hindered by the fourfold bond,2 261 The body flood-engulfed and drowned, In net of latent bias caught, 573 To the five Hindrances a slave, By restless play of mind obsessed, By pregnant craving ever pursued, In impediments of illusion wrapped: -) 574 Lo! such a thing this body is, Carried about on Karma's car, To manifold becoming doomed, Now to success, to failure then. 575 And they who say of it 'it is mine!' - Poor foolish blinded many-folk - They fill the dreadful field of death,3 Grasping rebirth again, again. 576 They who this body seek to shun, As they would serpent smeared with slime, They, vomiting becoming's(rebirth’s) root (cause), Shall make an end, sane and immune. ---- Kappa, hearing the Lord(Buddha) discourse in so many figures on the nature and destiny of the body-complex, in fear, and aversion at his own body, pleaded him in distress for initiation into monkhood. The Lord(Buddha) consigned him to a bhikkhu(monk) to be initiated into monkhood. Kappa received five exercises, and forthwith attained arahantship(enlightenment) as his hair was being shaved. He upon that went to render homage to the Lord(Buddha), and seated at one side, declared aññā''(supreme attainment)'' in those very verses. Hence they became Thera-verses. ---- 1 On this verse that may have been annexed, proverb-wise, from Animistic literature, the Commentary has: 'In just this world having thrown away (chaḍḍetvā) .... By these words he shows that, since the body is a transitory thing, no tie is to be formed.' Dr. Neumann considers that what may be thrown off is the power of death. 2 Viz., covetousness, ill-will, faith in ritual, clinging to dogma (Bud. Pay., p. 804 f.; Compendium, p. 171). On the four Floods and sevenfold Bias (anusaya) see (Compendium, iremain., f.). 3 Cf. verse 456. ----